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There’s little doubt that TikTok drives the discovery of new and unfamiliar music. Exactly how much engagement it creates downstream — at on-demand music streaming platforms — is less clear.
It’s been roughly two months since Universal Music Group announced its decision to remove its catalog from TikTok after the companies’ licensing agreement ended on Jan. 31. To see if its absence from TikTok has hurt UMG’s streaming numbers, Billboard looked at Luminate’s weekly market shares for UMG, as well as for Sony Music and Warner Music Group, going back to the beginning of 2023.
The conclusion? Thus far, there’s no clear evidence that UMG’s U.S. market share has been affected by its catalog’s removal from the wildly popular platform. Since the week ended Feb. 8 through the week ended Mar. 28, UMG’s market share has not deviated from what could be considered normal trends. Importantly, the company has not suffered a major blow — either in market share or chart appearances — while absent from TikTok.
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In the eight weeks since TikTok started pulling UMG catalog following the lapse of their licensing agreement, UMG’s overall on-demand audio streaming market share (using a moving four-week average to smooth out fluctuations) dropped 1.8% — not 1.8 percentage points — from 38.72% to 38.02%. Most of that drop came from a 5.8% decline (from 34.42% to 32.43%) in market share of current (less than 18 months old) titles — an entirely normal fluctuation that reflects the ebbs and flows of any music company’s new release schedule. Since early 2023, the eight-week change in UMG’s current market share (again, using a moving four-week average) has dipped more than 5% five times. Sony Music experienced a 5% or greater decline six times. Warner Music Group saw it happen seven times.
Catalog (music over 18 months old) market share is less driven by music companies’ new release schedules but also tends to see small increases and decreases. In the eight weeks ended March 28, UMG’s catalog market share declined 0.8% (from 40.01% to 39.7%). That wasn’t atypical; WMG dropped 0.9% over the same period. Going back to the beginning of 2023, UMG’s catalog market share gained more than 1% six times and fell by more than 1% four times. UMG’s competitors saw their catalog market shares fluctuate by more than 1% more times than UMG.
Given the importance of on-demand audio streaming to record labels, a loss in market share would hit UMG in the pocketbook. In 2023, UMG’s record labels received about $6.17 billion in royalties from streaming, according to its 2023 annual report. Just a 5% decline in streaming revenue is worth over $300 million annually. TikTok, on the other hand, is a relatively small part of UMG’s business. The previous licensing deal with TikTok was worth about 1% of UMG’s annual revenue, CFO Boyd Muir stated in the company’s Feb. 28 earnings call — equal to $120 million annually based on 2023’s total revenue.
TikTok has a well-earned reputation for driving chart success for tracks — from Glass Animals’ “Heat Waves” to Doja Cat’s “Paint the Town Red” — by raising their profiles and creating downstream traffic at on-demand streaming services. A 2023 TikTok study conducted by Luminate found that higher TikTok engagement corresponds with elevated streaming volumes and that U.S. TikTok users are more likely than average consumers to both stream music and subscribe to a music streaming service. TikTok engagement went offline, too: The study found that 38% of TikTok users in the U.S. went to a show in the last 12 months and that 45% bought some merchandise — suggesting higher-than-normal levels of engagement with music.
But there’s evidence that TikTok is less valuable to music discovery than music streaming services that still offer UMG’s catalog. TikTok users who would potentially discover UMG’s music “still have a lot of ways to find new music and new artists in the absence of TikTok,” MusicWatch managing partner Russ Crupnick tells Billboard via email, “though admittedly it’s an important option.” MusicWatch has found that TikTok users are three times as likely to cite their favorite streaming service as the top source for music discovery as they are TikTok. And two-thirds of TikTok users say music streaming services are a source for hearing new songs and new artists; 49% of TikTok users cite TikTok as a favorite for finding new music.
Still, an absence from TikTok means UMG’s artists aren’t reaching young consumers where they spend much of their time. TikTok is an especially popular option for teens, notes MIDiA Research’s Tatiana Cirisano. A MIDiA survey of U.S. consumers found that 24% of all people surveyed listen to songs they first heard on TikTok on a monthly basis. That number jumps to 52% for 16-to-19-year-olds, and 55% of people in that age group say TikTok is one the top three places where they discover new music — ahead of YouTube (47%) and music streaming services (36%).
Looking at only streaming market share data does not capture the full picture, though. It’s entirely possible that UMG has been hurt by its absence from TikTok in other ways. If its catalog were available at TikTok, UMG could have had one or more out-of-left-field viral hits thanks to the unsolicited usage of its music by TikTok users. After all, TikTok can surface old music in expected ways.
What’s more, two months is also too little time to draw any grand conclusions. “The constant fluctuation in release schedules as well as the ever-evolving ways that consumers use social apps mean that it will be necessary to assess over a much longer timescale,” Chaz Jenkins, Chartmetric’s chief commercial officer, tells Billboard in an email. Additionally, Billboard examined market share in the U.S. only. Global market share data would tell a fuller picture.
Besides, some artists have found ways to work around the ban. As Billboard reported in February, artists are doing acoustic versions of songs, speeding up the recordings’ tempos and posting interviews to stay in front of their fans. “Artists impacted by this are just being more creative on TikTok about how they’re getting music out,” said Shopkeeper Management digital marketing manager Laura Spinelli.
For all of TikTok’s promotional value and ability to break hits, the app might be more of a silo than people think: MIDiA also found that 76% of consumers who said TikTok is a main source of music discovery don’t seek information on an artist after finding a song on the app. In other words, what happens on TikTok often stays on TikTok. Let’s see if the impact of UMG’s absence from the app will be just as contained.
Universal Music Group (UMG) is facing a lawsuit that claims a 1992 Mary J. Blige hit featured an unlicensed sample from a 1973 funk song that’s famous for being sampled in dozens of other tracks, including releases from Biggie and Tupac as well as a recent Doja Cat tune.
In a complaint filed Thursday (April 4) in Manhattan federal court, Tuff City Records accused Universal Music Publishing Group (UMPG) of copyright infringement over Blige’s “Real Love,” which spent 31 weeks on the Hot 100 in 1992 and reached a peak of No. 7 on the chart.
The allegedly-copied song? “Impeach the President” by the Honey Drippers — a legendary piece of hip-hop source material with a drum track that’s also been sampled or interpolated by Run-DMC, Dr. Dre and many others. Most recently, it was featured in Doja Cat’s 2023 track “Can’t Wait.”
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In the complaint, Tuff City’s attorneys say they have “advised defendant repeatedly of the presence of the uncleared sample” in “Real Love” but that Universal has done nothing about it.
“Defendant has repeatedly refused to engage plaintiff in substantive negotiations to rectify the foregoing, let alone agreed to compensate Plaintiff for the past infringement or on an ongoing basis,” wrote Tuff City’s attorney Hillel Parness in the complaint.
Blige herself is not named in the lawsuit nor accused of any wrongdoing.
In a bizarre wrinkle, Tuff City claims that UMG Recordings — a subsidiary of UMG and the owner of the master to “Real Love” — has already reached an agreement regarding the use of the uncleared sample on the sound recording. But they say the music giant’s publishing arm has refused to do the same as it relates to the underlying composition.
“Defendant’s refusal to cooperate with plaintiff is difficult to reconcile with the fact that plaintiff reached an agreement with UMG Recordings,” Tuff City’s attorneys write.
Tuff City, which owns a large catalog of old songs, is no stranger to copyright litigation. Over the past fifteen years, the company has sued over tracks by Jay-Z, Beastie Boys, Christina Aguilera, Frank Ocean and others, typically alleging that they featured unlicensed samples or interpolations.
That process has not always gone smoothly. In 2014, a judge dismissed a case over Jay-Z’s “Run This Town” on the grounds that any alleged sample was “barely perceptible” after multiple listens. In 2018, another judge ordered Tuff City to repay hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal fees spent by Beastie Boys defending a case that was “clearly without merit.”
The new case is also not the first time Tuff City has sued over “Impeach the President.” Way back in 1991, the company sued Sony Music and Def Jam over claims that producer Marley Marl had illegally sampled the track on LL Cool J tracks “Around the Way Girl” and “Six Minutes of Pleasure.”
At the time, the lawsuit was a novel legal attack on sampling, which had long been at the core of hip-hop but had rarely involved paying for licenses or seeking authorization. In a 1992 article, the New York Times warned that Tuff City’s lawsuit over “Impeach the President” could fundamentally change hip hop, forcing rappers and producers to clear every element used in their albums — a formidable idea at the time.
“A single rap album can include dozens of samples, from single drumbeats to full musical phrases,” the New York Times article reads. “Finding the copyright owners, negotiating fees or royalties and gaining legal clearance is time consuming and can add tens of thousands of dollars to the production costs.”
Tuff City’s case eventually settled on confidential terms, but it proved to be a sign of things to come. In the years since, federal courts have ruled that nearly any amount of sampling of sound recordings counts as copyright infringement. As a result, labels and artists today attempt to clear almost any direct sampling in their songs and will typically remove those elements if a deal can’t be reached.
Of course, Blige’s “Real Love” came out just months after Tuff City filed its case against LL Cool J, and well before such practices had become universal. It’s unclear why the company waited more than 30 years to sue over it, but copyright law has a so-called “rolling” statute of limitations that allows for such long-delayed actions.
A spokesman for UMG did not immediately return a request for comment.
Texas officials are expecting more than 1 million people to visit the state Monday (April 8) for a chance to experience a rare total solar eclipse in the state that will be visible from the Texas border town of Eagle Point all the way to Texarkana.
To mark the event, the state will be home to more than a dozen festivals celebrating in true Texas style: from the Salt Lick BBQ festival honoring the beloved Driftwood brisket and ribs joint in Texas Hill Country to the rugged Texas Traditions camping fest, where attendees must sign a waiver acknowledging the danger posed by “poisonous snakes, reptiles, spiders and insects; diseased or startled animals, dogs, snares and traps; ladders, deer blinds, trucks, jeeps and four-wheelers.”
But the state’s largest celebration will be the Texas Eclipse festival, to be held on a sprawling ranch in Burnet, Tex., 100 miles north of San Antonio. Texas Eclipse is organized by a newly formed alliance of independent promoters including longtime EDM promoter James Estopinal and his recently rebranded Texas concert outfit Disco Presents; technologist, entrepreneur and Texas Eclipse festival founder and “head of alignment” Mitch Morales; and California-based festival organizer, curator and producer Gwen Gruesen from Symbiosis Gathering.
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Texas Eclipse is being headlined by U.K. superproducer Paul Oakenfold, American indie dance duo Big Gigantic, veteran dance producer Tycho and Philly dubstep superstar Subtronics. Other performers include jam scene super franchises like String Cheese Incident, Disco Biscuits, Joe Russo’s Almost Dead along with dozens of others, including CloZee, Boogie T, LP Giobbi, Zeds Dead and Bob Moses, who will appear across six stages curated and designed by the festival’s 12 global partners.
“People are drawn to eclipses in part because of the potential to experience something bigger than themselves,” says Gruesen, who is the only one of the three organizers to have witnessed an eclipse in person, having put together more than a half-dozen festivals and experiences from North America to Australia around totality events like the one taking place Monday. She notes that it’s the job of event organizers not to supplement the experience but to create opportunities to highlight the eclipse as a headliner.
To that point, adds Morales, “We’re not programming any content during the totality event. We don’t think we need to augment that experience.”
Music only represents a fraction of the bookings for the camping festival, which also includes hundreds of speakers including funghi expert Paul Stamets, environmentalist Adrian Grenier and more than 20 astronauts and researchers from the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies. Attendees can attend yoga, movement and meditation instruction and experience immersive art from collective Meow Wolf as well as workshops from visionary artist and storyteller Hannah Muse.
Estopinal, a veteran live music promoter who played a key role popularizing raves and live EDM shows beginning in the 1990s, tells Billboard that Texas Eclipse has been one of the most challenging events he’s ever promoted due to its geographic isolation and the sheer size of the site being built.
“This is one I will never forget and I’m excited to pull it off,” Estopinal says. “From the size of the event, to the sheer scale, it’s unlike anything I’ve ever seen and I can’t wait to see what happens.”
The 2024 eclipse will first be viewable in the coastal Sinaloan city of Mazatlan, Mexico around 11 a.m. CT. In the U.S., it will be visible at Eagle Pass, Tex., starting at 1:30 pm CT and slowly moving Northeast through Texarkana, Ark., before crossing into, Missouri, Kentucky, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Pennyslvania, New York, Vermont and New Hampshire. The total eclipse will end its U.S. journey in Caribou, Maine, before crossing into New Brunswick, Canada. It will last be viewable on the French islands of Saint Pierre and Miquelon.
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A group of criminals pulled off the biggest heist ever in Los Angeles. Thieves stole almost $30 million in cash from a holding facility on Easter Sunday.
As spotted on Raw Story, the burglars brought the plot from the Ocean’s Eleven to real life. The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) say that the crew broke into a money holding facility in the neighborhood of Sylmar. According to a source who spoke to the Los Angeles Times, the unidentified individuals broke into the building’s roof and evaded the security system all together. Once inside, they reportedly accessed the vault without issue and made off with close to $30 million dollars in cash.
The perpetrators were so experienced that the staff at the facility didn’t notice the money missing right away. “It’s just mind blowing that you would never suspect it,” an anonymous employee told ABC News. “$30 million in the Valley, gone. How? Why? I’m still trying to process it. Was it an inside job? Was it just one person? Was it a group? You know, there’s a lot of questions.” The LAPD and FBI have confirmed they are working and “have a joint investigation into an alleged burglary that occurred on Sunday evening, March 31, 2024. No additional information related to the incident is being released,” the agencies confirmed in a joint statement.
You can view reporting live from the scene below.
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Sean “Diddy” Combs and his son Christian “King” Combs are facing a new lawsuit claiming the younger Combs sexually assaulted a staffer on a luxury yacht in the Caribbean.
In a complaint filed Thursday in Los Angeles court, Grace O’Marcaigh says that she was working as a stewardess on a superyacht charted by the Combs family in December 2022 when an intoxicated Christian served her “spiked tequila shots” and then assaulted her.
“Prior to being sexually assaulted by defendant Christian Combs, plaintiff planned to work the entirety of her career in hospitality and the yachting industry,” O’Marcaigh’s attorneys write. “Unfortunately, those plans have been derailed due to the trauma plaintiff continues to have as a result of the assault.”
The new lawsuit was filed by the same attorney, Tyrone Blackburn, who filed a similar case against Combs in February on behalf of producer Rodney “Lil Rod” Jones. The new complaint claims that Jones was present for the alleged attack, and that he recorded some of the incident.
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In addition to those two cases, Combs has been hit with a slew of other allegations of sexual assault and other wrongdoing over the past six months, including a quickly-settled case filed by his ex-girlfriend Cassie and a still-pending lawsuit filed a woman who claims Combs raped her when she was 17. The rapper is also facing an apparent federal criminal investigation, which led to raids of his homes last month. Combs has strongly denied all allegations of wrongdoing.
In the new lawsuit, O’Marcaigh claims that Christian Combs arrived to the chartered yacht via smaller boat at 5 am on Dec. 28, 2022. She says he then “insisted” that she take shots of tequila, which she quickly came to suspect had been spiked with drugs. After she attempted to exit the situation, O’Marcaigh says he “violently” grabbed her and began to grope and assault her.
Because Jones was present and recording, O’Marcaigh says she has a recording in which she tells the younger Combs “excuse me, you don’t touch my legs like that” and “you can take your hand off my ass.”
Later in the same evening, O’Marcaigh says Combs demanded that she find him a place to sleep. When she took him to the yacht’s cinema, she says he “blocked her from exiting,” then “became physical and aggressive” even as she “pushed him back constantly.”
“Defendant C. Combs then took off all of his clothes,” O’Marcaigh’s attorney says. “His penis was erect, and he grabbed her arms and was trying to force plaintiff to perform oral copulation on him.”
The lawsuit does not claim that the elder Combs participated in the assault. But she says he orchestrated a “coverup” that resulted in her eventual firing from her job. And she says he bears ultimate responsibility for his son’s actions because he chartered the yacht.
“Defendant S. Combs fostered and encouraged an environment of debauchery,” O’Marcaigh’s attorneys write. “He intentionally created an unsafe environment that gave license to [Christian] to believe that he was free to sexually assault plaintiff.”
A representative for Sean Combs did not immediately return a request for comment.
Canadian artists are speaking out against anti-trans legislation.
The Tegan and Sara Foundation has published an open letter signed by some of Canada’s best known musicians and entertainers, including Neil Young, Alanis Morissette, Elliot Page, k.d. lang, Sarah McLachlan, Carly Rae Jepsen and many more. The letter, titled Artists Against Anti-Trans Legislation in Canada, has over 400 signatories. Its publication date, Mar. 31, is also Trans Day of Visibility.
Led by indie pop siblings Tegan and Sara, the open letter is an explicit pushback on recent and in-progress legislation that limits trans rights in several Canadian provinces.
“We are trending towards more harmful anti-trans legislation in Canada, and we call on our communities and local and national policymakers to put a stop to this concerning surge in anti-trans policy,” the letter states.
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Saskatchewan and New Brunswick have both implemented policies that require parental consent for educators to use chosen names and preferred pronouns for students under sixteen. In February, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith announced plans for policy changes to LGBTQ+ health care, education and sports, including banning hormonal treatment and puberty blockers for trans youth. Smith’s policies would also require parental consent for students to participate in educational instruction that addresses sexual orientation and gender identity.
At the national level, Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre has made recent comments indicating he would support banning trans women from women’s sports and washrooms. With a federal election on the horizon, LGBTQ+ rights could face rollbacks across the country.
“Far right groups are tapping into fear and pitting us against each other so they can create a Canada where we’re afraid of difference,” reads the letter. “The government should never put themselves between parents, their kids, and evidence-based healthcare and supports.”
While the letter is primarily written to affect change within the country, it also combats the perception of Canada as a human rights haven. “The reality is that Canada is not immune to the global attack on the trans community and their access to inclusive spaces, healthcare and freedoms.” – Rosie Long Decter
Industry Remembers Trailblazing Booking Agent and Label Executive Pegi Cecconi
Pegi (Margaret Anne) Cecconi, a trailblazing Canadian booking agent and record label executive, died on March 28, at age 70. She had been battling PSP (Progressive Supranuclear Palsy).
Her immense impact on the Canadian music industry over almost five decades was rightfully recognized in 2020 when she received the Walt Grealis Special Achievement Award at the Juno Awards, only the third woman to have received that prestigious honour.
An obituary posted by Cecconi’s family on her Facebook page noted, “As social convenor, Pegi booked bands for school dances, an undertaking that required serious grit when dealing with both performers and patrons. It was a quality that prepared her well for her trailblazing career in the male-dominated entertainment industry where she would thrive for almost 50 years.”
Female booking agents were rare in the 70s when Cecconi started, but she built her name to help establish SRO Management and later the record label Anthem. It started with a small roster spearheaded by Rush and Max Webster, alongside Liverpool and A Foot in Coldwater. Prior to Anthem, Rush was on Moon Records, and the three members, Geddy Lee, Neil Peart and Alex Lifeson, became associate directors of Anthem.
Decades of work with Rush is a clear highlight of Cecconi’s CV. On learning of Cecconi’s death, Rush frontman Geddy Lee posted this salute to Cecconi on Instagram: “Pegi Cecconi – whose laugh could be heard the moment she entered any venue. Thanks Peg, for 50 years of having our backs… wherever you’re headed they ain’t ready for ya!”
Over her long career, Cecconi took prominent roles in some of the Canadian music industry’s major trade organizations. She had long stints on the board of directors of both the Canadian Independent Music Association (CIMA) and The Foundation Assisting Canadian Talent On Recordings (FACTOR), also serving as Chair and Treasurer at the latter. She also served on the Board of MMF Canada, receiving its Brian Chater Pioneers Award in 2015, and held positions with the Independent Digital Licensing Agency (IDLA) and the Canadian Musical Reproduction Rights Agency (CMRRA).
Equally important was her invaluable role as a mentor and role model for women wanting to succeed in the male-dominated world of the Canadian music business. Effusive tributes to Cecconi on social media posts in the wake of her passing certainly testify to that.
Read more tributes from all facets of the Canadian industry here. – Kerry Doole
Last Week In Canada: New Funding Is Coming
It’s time for another spindle around the Executive Turntable, Billboard’s comprehensive(ish) compendium of promotions, hirings, exits and firings — and all things in between — across music.
Warner Chappell Music‘s sync team gained a seasoned pro in Shelby DiPerri, who has joined the publisher as its new vp of creative sync. DiPerri, who boasts over 15 years of creative licensing experience, will focus her efforts on pitching WCM’s boundless catalog to the film, TV, gaming and sport-ball sectors. For the last dozen years, she has worked at Round Hill’s Zync Music, serving as head of film & TV for half that time. Prior to Zync, DiPerri held positions at Victory Records and Atlantic Records. Her specialty over the years, especially at Zync, has been targeting projects and trends to create “perennial sync copyrights” for its writers and others, according to the announcement. Based in Los Angeles, DiPerri will report to svp of creative sync Rachel Jacobson. “[Shelby] brings passion and drive to every project she’s across – both our team and our amazing roster of songwriters are lucky to have her here at Warner Chappell,” said Jacobson. “Her in-depth knowledge of creative pitching and licensing has established her as one of the very best creatives in the field.”
Resident Advisor (aka RA), the online dance and electronic music magazine, hired veteran journalists Gabriel Szatan and Rachel Grace Almeida to be editor and deputy editor, respectively. The London-based Szatan joins RA following a three-year tenure as head of dance and electronic at Tidal, with a previous stop at Boiler Room and a slew of bylines as a regular contributor for Pitchfork, Guardian, Billboard and elsewhere. Almeida will also be based in RA’s London office following six years as a top editor of Crack Magazine out of Berlin. She has written for Bandcamp, Time Out, DAZED and other outlets. RA also announced that Carlos Hawthorn has been promoted to managing editor, while Nyshka Chandran is now the mag’s first futures editor. “We’re in an undoubtedly fortunate position to be expanding our cultural coverage at a time when everything feels in a state of contraction,” Szatan said in announcing the moves. “With this quality team now in place, and RA’s door remaining open to a network of premium contributors around the globe, we intend to make the best of it.”
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Marni Greenberg joined SoundCloud as svp and head of communications. She was most recently vp of communications at Sofar Sounds and prior to that was head of music communications at YouTube, where she worked for six years. “It is very important for SoundCloud to tell our story and Marni has the deep public relations experience needed in the fields of music, technology and brands to bring our communications,” said SoundCloud chief Eliah Seton.
It was a busy week for BRING, UMG’s all-purpose creative agency based in Australia, which promoted two key members and hired another. Bella Ziino was promoted to senior account director and James Wilkinson has been appointed senior creative manager, while Lucy Ruff joins the company as business development director. BRING specializes in music campaigns, brand strategy, live events, merch ideation, media partnerships and more. With the recent moves, the brand — which prides itself on “turning fan love into brand love” — said it now has a gender split of 50-50 across all levels.
Barry Weiss’s nearly decade-old RECORDS promoted David Enriquez to executive vp and Andrew Saltman to vp of marketing and digital strategies. The elevated roles for the NYC-based execs apply to the company’s RECORDS and RECORDS Nashville labels. Enriquez is a RECORDS lifer, having joined at its 2015 inception, and was previously senior vp. He reports to Weiss and will continue marketing and developing label artists across all genres. Enriquez’s big wins in recent years include crossover star Dax, country breakout George Birge and Florida rapper iCandy. Saltman joined RECORDS in 2017, most recently serving as senior director of marketing & digital for the full roster. He reports up to Enriquez and recently helped spearhead Birge’s debut single “Mind on You” to a No. 1 finish at country radio and is taking the lead on marketing efforts for the singer’s next single, “Cowboy Songs.”
Big Machine Label Group added Dexter Bensman as senior director of digital marketing and Rebecca Kerr as manager of communications, helping to further elevate the label’s roster of artists including Thomas Rhett, Carly Pearce, Lady A, Tim McGraw and Chris Janson. Bensman, who previously served as director of digital marketing at Brown Sellers Brown Management, will oversee the label group’s digital marketing strategies and elevate the online presence of the label’s roster. Kerr joins Big Machine from The Oriel Company, where she contributed to publicity efforts for artists including Jason Isbell and Riley Green. –Jessica Nicholson
Brown Sellers Brown, as in Paul Brown, Jason Sellers and Benny Brown, announced two new hires in social media roles and an equal number of reductions in its radio department as the company enters restructure mode. Jessica Crans joins BSB as director of social media marketing and Hannah Kennedy as social media marketing, with more staff additions expected soon in the company’s digital service relations and artist support departments. Over in the radio department of Stone Country Records, one of BSB’s affiliated labels along with Quartz Hill Records, Kerry Wolfe and Matt Galvin have left the company with no plans to fill their positions. “We so appreciate all that Matt and Kerry have brought to our radio promotions department at Stone Country Records over the past couple of years,” said partner Paul Brown. “Their knowledge and talents in the world of radio promotion are unmatched.”
Marauder co-founder Kodi McKinney has stepped away as partner of the New York-based creative marketing firm to pursue other opportunities in music, marketing and elsewhere. McKinney said he’s confident the company is in good hands with Rev. Moose, with whom he started the company in 2015. “Growing [Marauder] from a dream with Rev. Moose into a top-tier US music marketing force over the last near-decade has been one of the great joys of my life,” said McKinney, who shares more on his website and can be reached kodi@meintheclub.com.
Copyright Alliance promoted Eileen Bramlet from svp of communications to chief operating officer; Kevin Madigan from vp of legal policy and copyright counsel to svp of policy and government affairs; Rachel Kim from copyright policy counsel to vp of legal policy and copyright counsel; and Courtney Lang from manager of digital marketing to director of marketing and business development. The trade organization, which lobbies for businesses that depend on copyright, also announced the recent hiring of Elly Mambounou as operations manager.
Kara Foley
PULSE Music Group promoted Kara Foley to senior vp and head of creative sync licensing, overseeing all publishing and label sync operations for the company. Foley is celebrating her tenth year at PULSE, where she started out as manager of creative licensing before climbing the ranks to vp of film & TV, her most recent title. Her sync wins over the years include placements in films like Paw Patrol: The Mighty Movie and TV series including Gotham Nights, The Grand Crew and All American. Prior to PULSE, Foley had stops at UMG and Warner Chappell Music. Foley is based at PMG’s Los Angeles headquarters and reports to co-CEOs Scott Cutler and Josh Abraham. You can reach her kara@pulsemusicgroup.com.
Salt, which built its own Software as a Service (SaaS) platform for processing and distributing rights holder royalties, hired Alberto Garcia for the role of senior vp of Europe and Africa. In a culinary twist, Garcia joined Salt from Mint. New sales and customer management will be his focus at Salt, where “his track record of achievement and deep understanding of the industry will undoubtedly enrich our organization and drive us towards even greater success,” said CEO Doug Imrie.
BBR Music Group/BMG Nashville hired Camille Kenny as senior director of A&R, reporting to VP of A&R Katie Kerkhover. Kenny will be responsible for developing and scouting artists. Kenny previously worked as senior director of A&R at Big Loud Records, A&R’ing for releases from Morgan Wallen, HARDY, Jake Owen and more. Kenny’s previous music industry experience includes time at WME and THiS Music. –J.N.
NASHVILLE NOTES: Red Street Records added two industry pros to the mix. Michael Steele, former director of playlist programming development at WMG, is the label’s new vp of streaming and playlist strategy. Bridget Herrmann, who honed her promo skills at A&M/Octone Records, Crush Music Management and Warner Music Nashville, joined as regional director of country promotion … Tape Room Music hired Noelle Peters as catalog manager and Luke Collins as creative coordinator. “Luke and Noelle have a bright future in the music business,” shared Tape Room president Blain Rhodes. “They both have a great work ethic and a strong passion for helping songwriters. We are lucky to have them join the team at Tape Room” … Magnolia Music Group added 30-year promotion veteran Ray Vaughn as national director of radio and streaming. He previously worked at Quartz Hill Records and prior to that was on staff at Warner Music Nashville.
New England Conservatory’s Jazz Studies Department appointed Grammy Award-winning trombonist and composer Kalia Vandever to its faculty beginning in the fall of 2024.
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences hired Bridgette Wilder to serve as its chief people and culture officer, a newly created position that combines the human resources teams of the Academy and the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures. She was previously the Academy Museum’s vp of people and culture and reports to Academy CEO Bill Kramer and Academy Museum director and president Jacqueline Stewart. Wilder previously served in C-suite roles at the California Institute of the Arts and Albany State University.
ICYMI:
Spotify named Christian Luiga to be its new chief financial officer to replace Paul Vogel, who stepped down from the CFO role at the end of March … YG Entertainment now has a lone CEO: Yang Min-seok, the younger brother of company founder Yang Hyun-sun … Billboard Women in Music honoree Michele Ballantyne (pictured with Mitch Glazier) was promoted to president of RIAA. She’ll continue to serve as COO.
Last Week’s Turntable: Coolest Job in Vegas Filled
The estate of Ronnie Spector, best known as the lead singer of iconic girl group The Ronettes, has enlisted Artist Legacy Group (ALG) to be its exclusive representative. Under the deal, ALG will provide comprehensive management services for the estate, including oversight of Spector’s personality rights and administration of her official digital and social media assets. ALG CEO Ashley Austin will also spearhead branded media, licensing and anniversary projects. A film adaptation of Spector’s memoir, Be My Baby, is currently in development at A24. Spector’s husband, Jonathan Greenfield, serves as managing director of the estate.
Lil Yachty launched Concrete Rekordz, a new record label joint venture with Quality Control Music/HYBE. The announcement was accompanied by “Family Business,” a new track and music video from Concrete Boys — a group composed of Lil Yachty, Karrahbooo and Camo! — that will make its home on the label. The group is slated to release its first compilation album, It’s Us Volume 1, on Friday (April 5).
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Dubai-based streaming platform OSN+ and music streaming service Anghami announced the completion of OSN+’s purchase of a majority stake in Anghami after receiving all necessary regulatory approvals. First announced in November, the merger puts OSN+ parent company OSN Group’s majority stake in Anghami at a valuation of $3.69 per share. According to a press release, the deal creates a company that boasts more than 120 million registered users, around 2.5 million paid subscribers and nearly $100 million in revenue at closing while bringing together OSN+’s library of 18,000 hours of video content with Anghami’s catalog of more than 100 million songs and podcasts. The combined entity will be led by Elie Habib, co-founder/CEO of Anghami, as CEO. Joe Kawkabani will remain CEO of OSN Group.
Virgin Music Group has partnered with 3AM Entertainment, a new label founded by British-Indian artist Jay Sean, producer/executive Jeremy Skaller and Jared Cotter, manager/vp of music at Range Media Partners. 3AM will focus on artists from the South Asian diaspora of all different genres. The first release under the deal is “Heartless,” a new single from Jay Sean featuring Ikky that’s slated for release on Friday (April 5); it will be followed by an album. Skaller and Cotter will serve as co-presidents at the new label, with Cotter continuing in his role at Range. Elsewhere, Sean’s longtime manager, Thara Natalie, will be chief operations manager; Madison Bickel will serve as GM; and Mahima Sharma will serve as an A&R out of New Delhi, India. Additionally, Sean’s co-manager, Aayushman Sinha, and his team at management company Represent will consult on A&R and strategy out of Mumbai, India.
Soundmouse by Orfium was selected as the official music reporting partner for broadcasters in South Korea by the South Korean Broadcast Music Identifying System (BROMIS), a consortium led by major broadcasters including KBS, MBC, SBS and four collecting societies. Under the three-year agreement, Soundmouse by Orfium’s music cue sheet reporting and audio recognition fingerprinting technology will be used by 36 broadcasters to track music usage across 175 TV channels and radio stations in Korea. Soundmouse by Orfium’s reports will be used to inform royalty distributions to songwriter, artist, producer and rights holder members of South Korean collecting societies. The deal was supported by the South Korean Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and the Korean Copyright Commission.
Danny Wimmer Presents (DWP) acquired two music festivals: Rocklahoma and Born & Raised, both of which are held at Rockin Red Dirt Ranch in Pryor, Okla. DWP will continue working with Pryor Creek Music Festivals, the original creator of both festivals, while several remaining stakeholders will remain involved in both events in 2024 and beyond. This year’s Rocklahoma is slated to run from Aug. 30-Sept. 1 with headliners Avenged Sevenfold, Disturbed and Slipknot. Born & Raised will take place Sept. 13-15 with Turnpike Troubadours, Whiskey Myers, Gary Allan and more.
BMG has acquired Dr. Alban‘s recorded interests in his catalog, including ’90s Eurodance hits “It’s My Life” and “Sing Hallelujah!” The company already owned the label share of the recordings. The catalog of the Nigerian-born Swedish artist and producer, born Alban Nwapa, also includes tracks such as “Hello Afrika” and “No Coke.”
Numero Group announced a partnership with New York indie rock label Tiger Style Records. Under the deal, Tiger Style’s catalog of 40 albums and a dozen EPs have been absorbed into the Numero Group ecosystem, including works by The American Analog Set, The Appleseed Cast, The Mercury Program, Tristeza, Her Space Holiday, The Album Leaf, Rye Coalition and Ida. Formed in 1998, Tiger Style, once owned by online music retailer Insound, went on hiatus more than 20 years ago. Much of the label’s discography is now available digitally via Numero Group, with several physical LP reissues and box sets slated for next year.
Industrial-focused private equity firm Allied Industrial Partners made an investment in Celebrity Coaches, a Nashville-based provider of transportation and logistics for the live entertainment sector. Celebrity Coaches will continue to be led by its founder, Jeff Michael, who will retain an ownership stake along with other members of the company’s management team including Josh Trivett.
ASM Global signed a multi-year booking agreement with Nevada tavern and slot route operator Golden Entertainment for exclusive booking rights to the company’s Laughlin Event Center and The Edge Pavilion — two music venues located at the Edgewater Casino Resort.
Music data company Musixmatch partnered with Runway in a deal that will bring the latter’s AI-powered media generation technology to the more than 1 million artists and musicians in the Musixmatch community, which will have access to Gen-2 and other Runway models to create synchronized lyrics and videos.
WavMaker, a music licensing platform that offers a music catalog for video creators featuring songs that have been cleared for commercial use, launched with $5 million in seed funding. The company was founded by CEO Matt Arcaini, director of label services Mark Stuart and director of marketing Caleb Grimm. The funding round was led by Vicky Patel, a principal in the Nashville-based record label Wavy Records and co-founder/principal at Monarch Media. The funds will be used to expand the platform’s capabilities, hire staff and increase customer outreach.
Business-to-business music and streaming platform Tuned Global partnered with international travel media network Spafax, which provides content technology and media assets for airlines to power cleared music playlists in in-flight entertainment systems. Spafax clients include Emirates, Qatar Airways, IAG, Lufthansa Group and Air Canada. Through the deal, Tuned Global will provide music-as-a-service a content management tool for Spafax curators to generate playlists. Spafax will also benefit from Tuned Global’s integration with music rights management and reporting company Crunch Digital, which verifies musical works available for use under Spafax and airlines’ existing music licenses with record labels and publishers.
It’s all about the artist, music executives say (and say and say). If you really look at the industry over time, though, it’s really all about the formats — the health of the business may have more to do with how people listen to music than what they actually listen to. For the last decade, that has been on-demand streaming, and the music business has boomed — from total revenue of $6.7 billion in 2014 to $17.1 billion last year, according to the late-March RIAA report. In inflation-adjusted dollars, the industry is worth almost double what it was at the beginning of the streaming boom. Internationally, the story is broadly similar — the business was worth $13 billion in 2014 and $28.6 billion last year, according to IFPI statistics.
In the U.S., at least, growth is slowing — revenue rose from $15.9 billion to $17.1 billion last year, and it hasn’t grown much in the last two years, accounting for inflation. The reason is simple: There are only so many streaming subscriptions to sell, and the U.S. now has a 12-month average of 96.8 million on-demand subscriptions in a country of 127 million households. It’s hard to know when we’ll reach Peak Subscription — 105 million in a year? 110 million in two? — but slower growth in the number of subscribers seems inevitable. This is one reason record companies are cutting back. It’s the end of hypergrowth for creators and rightsholders — at least in some places.
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Those places also include most of Europe, where the recorded music business grew 8.9%, according to the IFPI’s 2024 Global Music Report, compared with 7.4% in the U.S. and Canada. In the developing world, where the music business is much smaller, the figures tell a very different story: Asia was up 14.9%, with much of that growth coming from China, which was up 25.9%; Latin America grew for the 14th consecutive year, by 19.4%; and revenue from sub-Saharan Africa rose 24.7%. These increases are taking place in smaller businesses, but they mean that there’s plenty of room for growth — it’s just moving south and east.
We’ve all heard the simple and optimistic version of what comes next: Just wait until everyone in China, India and Brazil subscribes to a streaming service! (I hope they subscribe to Billboard Pro while they’re at it.) But this assumes a world where the global middle class continues to grow, trade and prosperity continue to expand, and developing economies stay relatively stable. Alas, as the small print says, past performance is not indicative of future results. Over the past two years, Russia has gone from a developing market into a geopolitical adversary, and tensions between the U.S. and China are heating up. (Whatever you think of globalization, it will be far worse in reverse.) If the U.S. forces a sale of TikTok, could China retaliate by imposing limits on American music? Could inflation in Latin America hurt consumer purchasing power in a way that stifles a streaming business that still depends more on advertising? Whatever happens is beyond the control of the music business. The potential is incredible — it’s just not reliable.
The truth is that there’s still plenty of opportunity in developed markets, including plenty of room to raise streaming subscription prices, but creators and rightsholders don’t have to just sit around and wait for that. Other opportunities are emerging, and growth could be fueled by licensing music for AI training, as well as for social media, video games, and the next iteration of the technology formerly known as the Metaverse.
Some of the most exciting opportunities might come from a traditional business model: Selling stuff. Yes, I know, it’s all so unbearably dreary compared to the “Free” future we were told to expect. But consider that, adjusted for inflation, the U.S. recorded music market is still only two-thirds the size of its 1999 peak. Back then — how old does that sound? — much of that revenue came from serious fans who bought a couple of albums a month instead of a couple of albums a year, mostly for more than the cost of a monthly streaming subscription today. Such dedication explains the fantastic growth in the vinyl market, which rose from $243.8 million in 2014 to $1.4 billion last year — almost a sixth the size of the music business of a decade ago in 2023 dollars. (I am proud to say that I have done my part.)
Sure, vinyl growth is slowing, too — the format isn’t for everyone and I am running out of shelf space myself, but consumers have demonstrated a willingness to spend more on their favorite artists, which is why music executives are so excited about superfans, which could be the most exciting opportunity available. The last decade of the music business was about making a hundred dollars a year from millions of people. The next 10 years will be about making millions — OK, probably thousands, but you get the idea — from hundreds of people. That won’t be easy, though. The music industry has always been, pardon the pun, a volume business. Making money from superfans requires finding that, figuring out what they want to buy, and marketing that, presumably online, better than live promoters or dedicated startups.
This could also solve one of the biggest problems with the recorded music business: it’s not making stars fast enough, and the new ones it has don’t shine for so many people. But what is a big problem in the hit-driven streaming business doesn’t matter so much when it comes to monetizing superfans — older acts still do big business, and there are riches in niches. From a financial perspective, K-pop is essentially a high-margin merchandise business focused on an audience that’s dedicated but not quite mainstream. And if labels are going to keep growing in the U.S. and Europe, at least some of their business might look a lot like that.
An attorney who filed one of the several sexual abuse lawsuits against Sean “Diddy” Combs is now facing potential discipline himself after a federal judge in another case sharply criticized him for filing suits designed to “garner media attention” and “embarrass defendants.”
In an order issued Wednesday (April 3) in a separate lawsuit, Judge Denise Cote referred Tyrone Blackburn to the grievance committee for New York’s federal court district – an entity that decides whether attorneys have violated court rules. She cited his conduct in five different lawsuits, saying Blackburn’s filings in those cases had featured “glaring deficiencies.”
“A reasonable inference from Blackburn’s pattern of behavior is that he improperly files cases in federal court to garner media attention, embarrass defendants with salacious allegations, and pressure defendants to settle quickly,” Judge Cote wrote. “Indeed, his submissions to this court have been rife with disturbing allegations against the defendants and defense counsel.”
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The order, which came in a legal malpractice lawsuit Blackburn filed last year, referred him to the grievance committee for the Southern District of New York for “such action as it deems appropriate.”
Judge Cote’s ruling is notable because Blackburn is currently serving as lead counsel to Rodney “Lil Rod” Jones, a producer who filed a sweeping abuse lawsuit against Combs in February. The lawsuit is one of several such cases filed against Combs, in addition to a federal criminal investigation that led to raids of his homes last month. Combs has strongly denied all allegations of wrongdoing.
In an email to Billboard on Thursday, Blackburn said: “Not sure how this is at all relevant to Rodney Jones’ case, or any other case I have. This will not have any impact on my ability to proceed in Mr. Jones’ case. Although Judge Cote’s decision was a referral to the SDNY’s grievance committee, and not a sanction, I plan on appealing the decision.”
In his lawsuit last month, Jones accused Combs of repeated sexual assault and harassment while Jones was working as a producer on the rapper’s 2023 The Love Album. But he also went further, claiming that Diddy and others had violated the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, the federal RICO statute best known for criminal cases against the Mafia. As part of those claims, he named several other prominent people as members of that alleged illegal conspiracy, including Universal Music Group CEO Lucian Grainge and former Motown CEO Ethiopia Habtemariam.
Blackburn has already faced scrutiny over those accusations filed on Jones’ behalf. In her response to the lawsuit, Combs’ attorney, Shawn Holley, took the unusual step of calling out her opposing counsel by name, saying that Blackburn had “ignored” evidence of Combs’ innocence before filing the case.
“Our attempts to share this proof with Mr. Jones’ attorney, Tyrone Blackburn, have been ignored, as Mr. Blackburn refuses to return our calls,” Holley said at the time. “We will address these outlandish allegations in court and take all appropriate action against those who make them.”
Last week, attorneys for UMG took similar aim at Blackburn. Arguing that Grainge had “utterly nothing to do” with the allegations against Diddy, the label’s lawyers said the claims were so “offensively false” that they would seek to punish Blackburn himself for filing them.
“A license to practice law is a privilege,” wrote Donald Zakarin, a longtime music industry litigator who represents UMG and Grainge. “Mr. Blackburn, plaintiff’s lawyer, has misused that license to self-promote, gratuitously, falsely and recklessly accusing the UMG defendants of criminal behavior.”
UMG’s filing last week said the company would seek legal sanctions against Blackburn under federal Rule 11, which requires lawyers to make a “reasonable inquiry” into allegations they file in court. That’s the same rule that Judge Cote cited Wednesday in her ruling against Blackburn, saying “his actions in this and prior cases indicate a repeated failure to meet his Rule 11 obligations.”
In arriving at that conclusion, the judge cited multiple instances in which Blackburn allegedly filed cases in the wrong court without properly investigating whether it was the right jurisdiction, as well as an incident in which he called a defense attorney “a disgusting racist” amid a dispute over picking a mediator. The judge also cited an allegation from an opposing lawyer that Blackburn had specifically filed a case in federal court, rather than state court, “because doing so would make the press more likely to pick up on it.”
“Significant resources have been spent by judges of the court and defendants named in actions he has filed to address glaring deficiencies in his filings,” Judge Cote wrote in her ruling on Wednesday. “A referral to this court’s Grievance Committee is warranted.”
It’s unclear how long such a case will take before the grievance committee renders a decision, or what kind of disciplinary measures the body might hand down.